


The  Wings Wherewith We Fly.

by TayBartlett9000



Category: Historical RPF, british history RPF
Genre: Acting, Equality, Future, Gen, Law, Seventeenth Century, society, women
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-08
Updated: 2019-03-08
Packaged: 2019-11-14 00:26:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 706
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18041948
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TayBartlett9000/pseuds/TayBartlett9000
Summary: It is 1660 in London. Kate, an aspiring actress, finally takes advantage  of  the change in societal  law permitting women to act upon the theatrical stage for the first time. She also wonders what new   laws may be passed that may help women rise a little higher  up the ladder of equality.Written for international women's day.





	The  Wings Wherewith We Fly.

London.

July. 1660.

 

 Kate stood backstage, the roar of the wildly excited crowd  echoing in her ears, her heart pounding with a strange sort of anticipation of her own. This was it. She had been  waiting for   decades for this  vital moment and now  said moment had come. In minutes, that adulated crowd would be cheering for her, a women of all things. It was a revolation.

 She  knew that she was not  the only woman poised on the threshold of societal change, and she knew that she was by no means the first woman to have  set foot on the stage, but she did know that she was one of the first women to be allowed to step onto the stage freely and without retribution. No longer would she have  to disguise herself as a  man in order to  play a woman. No longer would she have to hide her ambitions beneath subterfuge  and some  clever costume  design. Now, she was free and legally able to spread her wings and fly onto that  stage and perform  the sort of role no man would ever be able to play convincingly.

 Kate was sure that for all  the promises of  acceptance as a woman on the stage, she and others like her would come  under fire by men who wished to keep women in their place. But on this day, the legality of such an honest activity was more than enough for her.

She was ready. In many ways, Kate felt as if she had always been ready. She had been born from the  womb an actress. She had yearned daily for the chance to step upon the stage an actress and now that she was about to do just that, Kate could hardly believe her luck. Her grandmother before her had  held ambitions  very similar to Kate’s own. But her grandmother had been born during the days of queen Elizabeth and William Shakespear. Back then, women had been denied the simple freedom of being able  to   act in the theatre and Kate was glad that she had been spared the burdens of being born in that same  eera. As she stood back stage, preparing  to step out as the  beautiful Shakespearian character of Juliette, the fair maiden whom Kate had desired to play for years, Kate wondered what else would become  legal for women now that they were able to act. Would women be able to own their  own property now that the restoration had come? King Charles, god bless his soul, had made sure that women had the freedom to express themselves through the medium of drama, so would he make other freedoms  available to them? Kate wasn’t sure.

It was time to  step forth and make her presence known as the beautiful damsel who hadcaptured the hearts of millions since the day she had first been portrayed back in the time of  queen Elizabeth.

Kate wondered what would have  happened  had the restoration not come. Perhaps the puritins would  have put even more restrictions on women  than those that had already existed in the days of King Charles the first. Perhaps the puritins, led by the tiranical Oliver Cromwell would have made sure that women were only  allowed to leave their husbands’ houses to visit other women or go to funerals. Kate didn’t think that she would  have been able to bear that.  Women she knew, did not  at all  belong in the second class position in society.  God had not placed women upon the Earth purely to serve and obey their husbands, though society taught her  that they were meant for nothing  more. The role  of women  was surely  to stand  on   equal footing with men, able to enjoy the same privelidges and education.   This was something that kate knew, despite what people had always told her.  Her family and many of her friends disagreed with Kate’s radical thinking,  but now that Kate had become an  actress, she found herself light headed  with hope. If women could be actors,  What else   could they do? Kate could only imagine. She could only hope that the  laws on women’s rights were changed further  in the years to come. Society needed it. That was for sure.

**Author's Note:**

> But of course, the movement for women's rights did not come into being until centuries later. For years, women's role as second class citizens in society would continue to be very much present and now, as we look back at history on this day, we are reminded of how far we have come along the road to true equality. But we are also reminded of how far we still have to go before both gender stand on an equal footing.


End file.
